METHODOLOGY

Learn to learn English.

Task-Based Learning

TBL focuses on using authentic language and asking students to do meaningful tasks with the language they have at their disposal. Tasks include: visiting a doctor, chairing a meeting, conducting a presentation, or making a phone call. At LYE, you will use language as the instrument in which you use to complete a task. We use tasks that reflect real life and you are free to use any language you want to develop language fluency and confidence. That way you will develop your ability to do things in English.

Communicative Language Learning

The Communicative Approach places an emphasis on helping students learn to communicate through interactions in English. This is done through authentic materials (i.e. reading or listening texts). Students are, then, provided with opportunities to focus, not only on the language but also on the learning process itself. More importantly, a link between classroom language learning and language activities outside the classroom is reinforced.

Goal-Based Learning

Goal-Based Learning focuses on developing real-world behaviours that will lead to performance improvement. It empowers learners to take control of their own learning journey by making them more able to respond to their own requirements.

Goal-based Learning is not about talking or doing things that may not be of value to you. It is about selecting the goals you want to achieve. A time-frame is set by the teacher and the learner works towards their goals over time, seeking support from their teacher as required. Goal-Based learning is a very good way to measure success and learn YOUR English.

Dogme ELT

Dogme is a rather unconventional approach to language learning because it deals with language in a different way. First, students’ language needs and interests come before any source of materials. Second, language work (grammar and vocabulary) arise naturally throughout the lesson. Third, the materials do not dictate what happens in the classroom. In other words, Dogme puts the learner back at the centre of the language learning process.

Visualization

Visualization is a technique commonly used in sports psychology to enhance all aspects of performance. In language learning this involves “visualizing a situation in which you, the learner, are successfully using the language for the specific purposes for which you have been learning it, whether social, business, academic … The visualization is likely to have more motivational power if it is clearly and concisely elaborated, with details of time, place, and people explicitly articulated. “ (Thornbury, S.)

Here’s a short anecdote to illustrate the power of visualization: “An American scholar who, before going to a conference in Europe, eliminated blocks about speaking French and Italian by working with imagery”. After visualising himself travelling through these countries and speaking fluently to everyone he met, “it was found that his fluency improved notably and with his Italian his accuracy did also.”

Lexical Approach

The Lexical approach emphasizes the idea that an important part of learning a language consists of being able to understand and produce lexical phrases as chunks. In other words, it believes that the building blocks of language learning and communication are not grammar but lexis (vocabulary). We believe that you’ll learn and become fluent faster if you learn lexical phrases, chunks and collocations.

Lexical Chunks that are not collocations: by the way -- up to now -- upside down -- If I were you -- a long way off

We believe that raising awareness of language learning strategies is the best way to focus on developing learners’ self-directed language learning skills. By equipping learners with strategies, we are essentially setting up the conditions to keep learners invested in their learning.

All strategies are transferable and relevant. That way learners can use them outside the classroom and consider the ones they use when doing specific tasks in the target language.